He is here

                 Rainy weather filled our days in Salt Lake, but we still had fun! Saturday night we got a short tour of downtown by the one and only Ashley Lower, which was a blast. Then Sunday we went to “Music and the spoken word" at the Mormon tabernacle, about 300 singers and lots of musicians, it was beautiful. They sang traditional American songs in light of Memorial Day.  Afterwards I went to church at a small church plant I found and the boys toured around the city. We met later at the city library. Later I will post the poem I wrote about that experience-seeing the library-because I could hardly put it into words. Basically my heart was shattered for the hundreds of homeless people packed into the small lobby waiting for the doors to open. And once they opened, in piled more and more homeless, seeking a warm, dry place to occupy them for the day. There were teens, adults, babies, and the elderly. People from all places and all walks of life.  Everything in me wanted to cry and scream at the same time-cry for their pain and scream for their justice. I wished I could place each one of them in a home, and provide them a job, a way out of the life they are stuck in. And knowing that I couldn’t was the hardest part of all. Court and I prayed for them over the phone, and I in my heart throughout the day, and then the boys and I left Salt Lake. There was no conclusion…there is still not. I know Jesus` heart breaks for those people, each one of them, and I know He understands their pain knows their story. I trust Him for all things, even in this, with no solution, God may you be the solution.

Bryse Canyon

            From Salt Lake we headed to the Timpanogos Cave near Provo, Utah. The hike was pretty short up, but steep, and then we did about a 45-minute tour of the inside of three conjoined caves. It was freezing cold, but beautiful. The boys were dying to go caving after being inside, wishing they could ditch the guide and go off-trail. My favorite part was our view of the Rockies as we climbed up and down the mountainside. After the cave we headed towards the Grand Canyon! We stopped somewhat early because we found a really cheap hotel, called Motel, in the middle of nowhere. We ate left over’s, played skat, and went to bed. Monday we made our way to Bryse National Park, we spent mostly the whole day there. We started out on a trail and then ended up off-roading until we found another trail on the other side of the park a few hours later. It was crazy, but definitely a great adventure and we saw so much of the park you can’t see from the trails. But the best part by far was the sign we found once we reached the end of the trail.

         From there we spent the night in the best/most ghetto hotel so far in Kanab, Utah. Tuesday we headed to the north rim of the Grand Canyon around noon. We were totally exhausted from our adventure in Bryse, so we didn’t do much hiking. We stopped at a few different look-outs and of course talked to some more Germany tourists (we have met Germans everywhere!) 

       Afterwards we headed back through Kanab into the Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park. The owner from the hotel the night before told us it was definitely somewhere we should check out. So we went and decided to camp there that night. We got there pretty close to sunset, set up our tent, and then the boys were awing over all the ATV`s around the campsites. Crazy enough, they got up the guts to go talk to the neighbors in hopes of riding their ATV`s and sure enough after some beer and a sitting by the fire, Rob told us he would take us riding the next morning. It was hilarious to watch them ride. We packed up pretty soon after that and then headed into town for a $5 buffet, which was awesome, boys ate their weight in salad and pizza.

      Our next stop was Mt. Zion National Park. We did a few short hikes because we didn’t have much sunlight left, but they were still beautiful-just riding up the shuttle and listening to all the history of the park was incredible. It is unbelievable to think the US Congress coined it Mt. Zion, to think how much America has changed, and our government. Nonetheless all the names reflected so much Biblical allegory and significance. My favorite was the Virgin River, and how, as small as it is, it gives life to the entire park. It is the source of all the rock formation and plant growth. Talk about streams in the desert. As we were hiking up we ran into a couple of guys and chatted with them a little bit. The funny thing is we later ended up camping right next to them…sharing a fire and some hamburgers and hotdogs on the grill. This morning we packed up camp and headed back into the park, just a couple of miles. The boys did a long hike and I stayed behind and read since I wasn’t feeling well. Then Christoph and I did a trail ride along the Virgin River later in the afternoon. Afterwards we loaded up and headed to Vegas where we are now. Sin City, that’s really all there is to say about it. My heart was really torn when in between all the nasty highway billboards was JESUS written in all caps. It is hard to believe He is here. It is hard to believe He is living in me when I am so full of sin and disgust, but He is. We know that He is, and we can trust it. That is a beautiful thing. He makes beautiful things out of dust. I am definitely looking forward to some time to relax and write and read before we go on to California, for that I am grateful. Stay tuned for our next adventures!